Garage shop brings bike savvy to Aliso Viejo

Feb. 6, 2014

Updated 12:02 p.m.

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Thad Sparrow, AJ Sura, and Ted Willard, from left are co-owners of G2 Bike in Aliso Viejo. Open a year, the bike shop has found its niche, between fixing kids bikes, selling $6,000 road bikes to the city's corporate executives, training mountain climbers, and leading rides into Aliso and Wood Canyon Wilderness. CHRISTINE COTTER, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

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Thad Sparrow, AJ Sura, and Ted Willard, from left are co-owners of G2 Bike in Aliso Viejo. Open a year, the bike shop has found its niche, between fixing kids bikes, selling $6,000 road bikes to the city's corporate executives, training mountain climbers, and leading rides into Aliso and Wood Canyon Wilderness. CHRISTINE COTTER, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

Thad Sparrow, AJ Sura, and Ted Willard, from left are co-owners of G2 Bike in Aliso Viejo. Open a year, the bike shop has found its niche, between fixing kids bikes, selling $6,000 road bikes to the city's corporate executives, training mountain climbers, and leading rides into Aliso and Wood Canyon Wilderness. CHRISTINE COTTER, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

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Thad Sparrow, one of three co-owners of G2 Bike works on a bicycle. The shop has found its niche in an interesting place, between fixing kiddie bikes, selling $6,000 road bikes to the city's corporate executives, training mountain climbers, and leading rides into Aliso and Wood Canyon Wilderness. CHRISTINE COTTER, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

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Open a year, G2Bike, Aliso Viejo's only bike shop has found its niche and has become a part of the community. CHRISTINE COTTER, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

Thad Sparrow, AJ Sura, and Ted Willard, from left are co-owners of G2 Bike in Aliso Viejo. Open a year, the bike shop has found its niche, between fixing kids bikes, selling $6,000 road bikes to the city's corporate executives, training mountain climbers, and leading rides into Aliso and Wood Canyon Wilderness. CHRISTINE COTTER, STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER

A.J. Sura met Ted Willard on the social cycling website Strava. Their blind date was a mountain bike ride.

It started a relationship that in 2012 led them to open the first bicycle shop in Orange County's youngest city. G2 Bike operates in a small, out-of-the-way industrial garage tucked away off Aliso Creek Road.

Since then, the shop has found its niche, fixing flat tires on kids' bikes, selling $3,000 road bikes to Aliso Viejo's executives, leading mountain bike rides into Aliso and Wood Canyons Wilderness Park, and training cyclists and mountain climbers with a special altitude simulation machine.

They took on a third partner. There are three people who work in the shop.

“This is it,” said manager/owner Willard, pointing to mechanic/owner Thad Sparrow. “Everyone that works here is part of the company. You're talking to the owner.”

Walk through an open garage door, the main entrance, and view the entire bike shop: There are two repair stands on one side, where Sparrow wrenches on bikes. On the other side, parts, tires and clothes hang from a wall.

A few stools are available for those who want to hang out after a ride or watch the work being done on their two-wheeled machine.

There's no showroom, like some big box-type shops, Sura pointed out, no bikes lined up, stacked on top of each other. While some Orange County bike shops are moving toward a “concept store” model where one brand, such as Specialized or Cannondale, provides much of the inventory, G2 has strived to stay independent and low-key, Sura said.

“We didn't want to compromise the mission of the shop,” Willard said, and they didn't want to feel like they should sell what people didn't need. “Our job is to try and solve the person's problem.”

GARAGE SHOP

That's the way Willard, 32, said he always wanted to be treated at bike shops, back when he was project manager for an architecture firm and moonlighting as a mountain bike and road racer on the weekend.

“I was in an industry surrounded by stressed-out, unhealthy people,” he said. He wanted an escape, a way to break into the bike industry.

But there were two problems: Willard had never worked at a bike shop, let alone run one, and he didn't have much money saved up.

Enter Sura, 41, who had money, shared a passion for bikes and had business savvy from the medical sales industry, where she still works.

“I threw what little money I had at it, and she made the rest happen,” said Willard, who even sold his car for the cause.

The couple tracked down the garage for rent, which was close to home and – most important – cheaper than most Orange County apartments. It might be hidden away, Sura said, but it's a big reason they've made it so far after a year.

“I can concentrate on keeping inventory and overhead low,” she said. “I don't have to focus on selling bikes.”

After full workweeks of selling medical products, Sura spends the rest of her time either at the shop or riding her bike. She races mountain and cyclocross bikes, too. It hasn't been an easy balance.

Sparrow, 41, has helped ease some of the pressure since he came onboard in August. He's worked on bikes for 22 years.

Each of them puts in 60 to 70 hours a week, Sura said.

CUSTOMERS FIND IT

G2 Bike gets Soka University students, the guy who wanted to overhaul his 30-year-old Peugot and the former professional racer who wanted his Felt race bike built up. After a year, word is starting to get out, Willard said.

Natalie Barrad rolled a dusty Cannondale mountain bike with two flat tires into the shop on a recent afternoon. It needed some work, but Sparrow and Willard were mostly focused on convincing Barrad, typically a road rider and triathlete, how much fun it is to ride on trails.

Sparrow offered Barrad some pedals to test out before she bought them for the bike. And fixing her tired-looking steed? It would be done by Saturday, Sparrow told her.

Her business over, Barrad hung around to chat about group rides.

“People are super comfortable,” Sura said. “When women come into the shop, they notice that I'm there. I make them feel good.”

The owners have tried to differentiate themselves wherever possible, from the no-drop Beers and Gears ride on Wednesdays in the summers, where all are welcome to tackle South County's steepest hills, to the Hypoxico altitude training machine that everyone from cyclists to a professional soccer player to a couple climbing Mount Kilimanjaro have paid to use.

“I know exactly how I was treated, and how my bike was treated,” Sura said of other shops she used to frequent. “And I knew I could do this better.”

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